October 2018 Feature

There is a strong call coming from Christian leaders to make a stand against those who call upon our legislators to review Section 377A of the Penal Code that criminalises homosexual acts.  Emotions are running high on both sides of the divide.  Some of us received requests to sign petitions from those who want homosexual acts to be decriminalised as well as from those who insist that Section 377A should remain as it is.

There are persuasive arguments on both sides.  It is not my purpose to rehash the arguments and to persuade on behalf of one side or the other.  It appears to me that the majority of the Christians are for Section 377A to remain undisturbed.  There is of course a minority of Christians who are for the repeal of the section.

My purpose is to highlight the need to be mature enough to persuade one another without ending up making wrong judgments against each other.  This is what I mean by “more an onion than an apple”.  The danger is that we may end up rejecting those who share the same faith but not the same position on this issue.  That would not be gracious nor kind.

For instance, it is easy to conclude that those among us who want the law to remain as it is are simply homophobic.  When we do that, we descend into name-calling.  It is also easy to conclude that those who are against criminalisation of homosexual acts are in support of the act.  In both situations, a judgment has been made against a fellow believer – and the judgment could be wrong and therefore unjust.

This hastiness to judge could well be the function of looking at the issues like an apple.  It is one whole.  You cannot separate the apple like you can with an onion by peeling off the layers.  In the latter, one can be against criminalisation without being for homosexual acts.  Like an onion, you peel each layer and you deal with the issues layer by layer.  In the former, the apple is one unpeelable whole, so if you are against criminalisation, you must be for the act itself.

As I read the arguments for and against the repeal of Section 377A, I am both optimistic and pessimistic.  Optimistic when we can pray and think through the issues and make a decision for ourselves according to our Christian conscience and understanding of the Word and respect others who, on their own conscience and understanding, make a different decision.  I am pessimistic when one is pressured to think that there is only one right decision and when one is quickly judged when one makes a decision that contradicts the “right” decision, whatever that may be.

There are two texts in the Scriptures that I feel should help us at this time towards a gracious and kind debate.

“Let your speech always be gracious, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how you ought to answer each person.” (Colossians 4:6).

According to Vincent’s Word Studies, both words are found only here in Paul’s letter to the Colossians.  The function of salt is both in preserving and in rendering something palatable.  In the context of speech, both in Greek and Latin authors, salt was used to express the pungency and wittiness of speech.  Horace speaks of having praised a poet for rubbing the city with abundant salt, i.e., for having wittily satirised certain parties so as to make them smart as if rubbed with salt.

Lightfoot gives some interesting citations from Plutarch, in which, as here, grace and salt are combined.  Thus: “The many call salt χάριτας graces, because, mingled with most things, it makes them agreeable and pleasant to the taste.”  Seasoned is, literally, prepared.  It is not likely that the fact has any connection with this expression, but it is interesting to recall Herodotus’ story of a salt lake in the neighborhood of Colossae, which has been identified, and which still supplies the whole surrounding country with salt (vii., 30).  The exhortation to well-seasoned and becoming speech is expanded in Ephesians 4:29; Ephesians 5:4, in a warning against corrupt communication.

Matthew Poole adds, “Let your speech be always with grace: because discourse is the tenderest part of our converse with men, especially those without, and ought to be managed with the greatest circumspection, upon occasions in every fit season, in imitation of Christ, who entertained those that did converse with him with gracious words, you should endeavour so to speak when called, that the hearers may conceive your discourse doth proceed from a gracious spirit, or grace in the heart, with meekness of wisdom, using knowledge aright, being in its tendency gracious, not ungrateful, (as tinctured with gall or venom), but ministering grace to the hearers.”

And “seasoned with salt”, “even as meat duly powdered with salt becomes acceptable to the discerning palate, so to the ear that heard the speech, fitly spoken words are of a grateful savour, cleansed from corruption.”

Paul also urges “…speaking the truth in love…” in Eph 4:15.  According to the Pulpit Commentary, the phrase “is hardly translatable in English.  It implies being true as well as speaking the truth and following the truth.  Truth is the element in which we are to live, move, and have our being; fidelity to truth is the backbone of the Christian ministry.  But truth must be inseparably married to love; good tidings spoken harshly are no good tidings; the charm of the message is destroyed by the discordant spirit of the messenger.  The more painful the first impression which a truth is fitted to produce (e.g., Ephesians 2:1-3), the more need is there for dealing with it in love – a much-needed and much-neglected exhortation.”

Of course, everyone on both sides of the divide believes that he is speaking the truth.  But the question is whether it is spoken in love.  I suggest that in peeling the onion, there are different layers of truth and we should be humble enough to accept that even when we have a common reference to the same Bible and the common illuminator in the Holy Spirit, we still end up having different theological positions locked up in different denominations and expressed in so many diverse Christian communities.  Clearly, like a diamond, we reflect different facets of the truth and we should be gracious and kind enough to respect one another’s position even when we are on different sides of the divide.

Dr. William Wan is the General Secretary of the Singapore Kindness Movement. He is also a winner of the Active Ager Award (Council of the Third Age) 2011. Prior to taking on this role as General Secretary, he was practising law and managing a psychometric company. Dr Wan also sits on the advisory panel of The Bible Society of Singapore.

September 2018 Feature

Recently, I became acquainted with the striking story of a 22 year old Singaporean while visiting a friend in San Francisco. At the age of 3, he relocated with his Singaporean parents to the United States. Being immersed in American life and culture, he grew up like any American would.

Life would have continued along the American path, if not for the letter he received from the Ministry of Defence fifteen years later, summoning him to enlist for national service.

What seemed striking to me was his subsequent response to the enlistment letter. Instead of perceiving national service as an inconvenient disruption to pursuits in “the land of opportunity” as some call America, he embraced it as an opportunity to deepen his roots. Taking his citizenship seriously, he discharged his responsibilities in the military with distinction and became an air warfare officer.

Cynics may interpret the above story as an expression of youthful idealism that so happens to be in line with national interest. Having personally met the young man and lived abroad for some years myself, I do not doubt his motivation for national service. There is something about citizenship that resonates deeply with our human desire for a sense of belonging and identity.

Recognising the theological and didactic potential of the citizenship imagery, writers of the New Testament employed it freely to convey their message to early believers living in the Graeco-Roman world.

The status of these believers as citizens or resident aliens were earthly realities that helped to elucidate teachings concerning Christian identity, its standard of behaviour and future hope. These teachings often juxtaposed the realities surrounding the earthly, political status of Christians with that of their heavenly citizenship. Indeed, priority is consistently accorded to the latter.

One of the clearest instances in which the Christian’s heavenly citizenship is given priority is found in Paul’s declaration to the believers in Philippi: “But our citizenship is in heaven.” (Phil 3:20). Paul’s declaration has a twofold implication for his recipients. Firstly, they are not to pursue “earthly things” as the “enemies of the cross of Christ” do (Phil 3:18, 19), but live lives which are in keeping with their heavenly citizenship. Secondly, they are to place their hope in no one else but “the Lord Jesus Christ” who has the power to “subject all things to himself” (Phil 3:21).

When situated within the political climate of Paul’s day, his declaration above is both radical and risky. The imperial cult worshipped the Roman emperor as saviour and Lord. Thus, calling Christians to confess Jesus of Nazareth not simply as “Christ” but also as “Saviour” and “Lord” is to pit the authority of Jesus with that of Caesar’s.

For Paul, the issue at stake in the Christian’s heavenly citizenship is allegiance to Jesus Christ. Working out what this allegiance means while living under Roman rule was a crucial aspect of early Christian discipleship.

Although the political context is different for Christians in Singapore, the same challenge of being citizens of heaven on earth still applies. Like the early church, we too must work out what it means to confess Jesus Christ as Lord in our context. Carrying out such a task responsibly would require us to take seriously the tension between Christ’s insistence that his kingdom is “not of this world” (Jn 18:36), and the equally clear assertion that “the kingdom of the world has become the kingdom of our Lord and of His Christ…” (Rev 20:15).

Holding on to this tension is important so that we do not fall into one of two errors: (1) failure to acknowledge the authority of Christ over the world, including civil institutions like governments; (2) failure to distinguish the authority of civil institutions from the authority of Christ over his church.

The first error leads to disengagement with society or nonchalance about our civil responsibilities. The second legitimises a politicised view of Christianity that treats our civil and political life as spheres in which the church has authority to govern.

As we celebrate 52 years of Singapore’s independence this year, it is appropriate to consider afresh what it means to live as citizens of heaven on earth. This task is especially critical in a time where the social fabric of our multi-racial and multi-religious society is being tested by the threat of religious extremism.

Often, there is no simple answer to the way our allegiance to Christ should look like in the specific details of our earthly citizenship. However, the Biblical portrait of such a citizen is clear.

According to the anonymous, second century writer of the Epistle to Diognetus, “Christians…inhabit the lands of their birth, but as temporary residents thereof; they take their share of responsibilities as citizens, and endure all disabilities as aliens. Every foreign land is native to them, and every native land, foreign territory…They pass their days upon earth, but they hold citizenship in heaven.” ¹

Like the saints of old, we long for “a better country, that is, a heavenly one” (Heb 11:16) and point others to its glory by the way we live.

Rev Dr Edwin Tay is the Vice-Principal of Trinity Theological College and an ordained minister of the Methodist Church in Singapore. He holds degrees from the National University of Singapore (BA), the University of London (MA), and the University of Edinburgh (PhD).

May 2018 Feature 

Contrary to what is sometimes taught and believed, the Reformation doctrine of Sola Scriptura doesn’t teach “Scripture good, Tradition bad.” Rejection of church traditions was and is not its goal at all. The Reformation doctrine of Sola Scriptura arose amidst the noise of competing authoritative voices during the medieval ages. These included the writings of church fathers, ancient creeds, papal declarations, liturgical traditions, and pronouncements by theological faculty.

Some of these authoritative sources for guiding faith and practice unfortunately deviated significantly from scripture. Sola Scriptura was thus a doctrine which affirmed that scripture was the supreme source of authority – not the only source of authority – for Christian faith and practice. Whatever was taught, preached, and practiced needed to have good support from scripture and had to arise from good interpretation and understanding of scripture. This affirmation of a high view of scripture is the Reformation’s legacy for the Protestant church.

Evangelical Christians in Singapore today claim that we affirm the same Reformation Sola Scriptura ideal. But do we really hold on to a high view of scripture? My colleagues and I teaching at the Singapore Bible College (SBC) often have long discussions not just about how biblical illiterate the church in Singapore is. For some of us, the greater concern now has shifted to how the church in Singapore hides behind the rhetoric of supporting a high view of scripture while practicing something else in reality. That is to say, while we tightly guard the idea of making scripture the basis of Christian belief and practices, how we handle scripture in reality falls very short of the Reformation ideals.

I teach a course on Bible Study Methods at SBC.  The course allows me to introduce to my students sensible ways of reading scripture in context.  At the same time, it also allows them to surface examples of bible study discussions, devotional readings, and sermons that they have encountered which violate the principles of sensible reading taught in class. Beyond just being able to point a finger at others, students inevitably also come to a point of self-awareness. This new realization is that their diet of devotionals, sermons, bible studies, and sloppy personal reading habits that often lead them to conclusions which, while not theologically incorrect, miss out the main message of the text.

A classic example is from John 2:1-11 where we find the account of Jesus turning water into wine.  A student pointed me to a daily devotional on this passage which has strong appeal to the modern audience but would not have made sense to John’s readers. In the devotion, the author declared that because the first miracle Jesus performed had to do with small details in the kitchen, it shows that God is interested in the little things of our mundane life. God wants to have an intimate relationship with His people!

Conclusions like these are multiplied in weddings sermons, bible studies, and visits to the Cana church while on Bible lands tours. In those settings, we hear messages that affirm the value of marriage, the legitimacy of drinking wine, the need for motherly interventions, as well as how the Christian life is made so much more complete when the believer opens his/her mind to daily miracles.

But is the big message of John 2:1-11 about marriage, wine, mothers, or looking out for miracles in our lives? There is no denying that all of the above conclusions from John 2:1-11 can bring encouragement to the Christian. What is important to note however is that settling for these conclusions force readers and listeners to miss the key points of bible passages and hence the intention and message of their authors.

When John recorded in his gospel the miracle of Jesus changing water into wine, it was part of a series of miracles that John took pains to document.  Far from existing to serve human need, the signs are focused on the identity of Jesus, the Son of God.

In the final verse of our passage is an important clue which John left for his readers: ‘What Jesus did here in Cana of Galilee was the first of the signs through which he revealed his glory; and his disciples believed in him’ (v 11). The clue hints that more signs will follow the first. Like the first, the subsequent signs will follow a similar pattern of revealing Jesus’ glory and giving reason after reason for the audience to know and believe in Jesus.  When we read them together as a composite whole, they make a compelling case for following Jesus.

Something was at stake in the life of the church that John was concerned about and trying to address. John’s Gospel was crafted for members of the early church at a time when God’s people badly needed to be strengthened in their faith foundations. There was opposition, persecution, and skepticism directed at those who followed Jesus. Whether it was opposition from the local Jewish authorities, persecution from the Roman political machinery, or the lure of Greek philosophies, these words by John were necessary for the survival of the church as members tried to make sense of the claims of Jesus and the costs that came with following Him.

My work in this season of life is very tied to research and ministry amongst youth and youth adults in Singapore churches. One observation I have made is that we are in a season when the next generation is leaving our churches. This is a generation that is encountering deep skepticism about Christian faith. Given the many attractive alternatives, there is no compelling reason for them to stay or to go to church.  Those who remain often do so only because of what Jesus or the church can offer them!

Even more reason, young people today need to encounter Jesus the way he is portrayed in scripture and not to merely incorporate him into their lives as divine ATM, butler, or therapist to serve our pursuits and passions. If the church persistently offers interpretations of scripture which separate our understanding of the gospel from the drama of encountering the Jesus found in the Gospels, how then do we deepen the roots of the next generation and challenge them to follow Jesus? This is Jesus, the Lord of Lord who challenges his followers to follow him on his terms. This is not Jesus, our genie in a bottle who panders to the first world problems and psychological needs that we seem to be so beset by.

There is a beautiful hymn “Ancient Words” by Michael W. Smith, and its chorus goes, “Ancient words ever true, changing me, and changing you. We have come with open hearts, oh let the ancient words impart.”

The reality too often however is that we have changed the meaning and substance of these ancient words. Our hearts are open, but we have changed the meaning and we have not been changed. We have merely steered the discipleship challenge in scripture to support our needs and wants!

By doing this, we shortchange ourselves, our young people, and our congregation members. We also lose our moral authority to challenge cult groups and groups that teach heresy because we play the same interpretive game that they do!

What sort of corrective measures can we undertake to recapture the Reformation ideal of Sola Scriptura where more faithful readings, interpretations, and understandings of scripture can be found? Space only allows me to highlight one simple application, which is to cultivate the habit of reading scripture well.

The reality is that we don’t have the habit of reading Scripture well. When we read novels, examine legal documents, or watch movies, we naturally work out way from beginning to end. The reason why we take pains to do so is because meaning is found in reading or watching a text in its entirety. We do not take a favorite sentence from the book, a favorite clause from the legal document, or a favorite still shot from the movie and make whatever we want out of it.

Yet we do this in our Bible readings and interpretations all the time! We violate all the rules of reading a text or watching a movie sensibly in how we read and apply scripture.

What evangelical Christians thus need to do is to cultivate the habit of reading long portions of biblical texts over and over again. Alternatively, we could cultivate the habit of listening to long portions of biblical texts regularly and repeatedly. It could be listening to whole gospels, epistles, or even books in one session. Or it could be listening to a chapter multiple times over to understand the contours and features of the text or to discern for repeated themes and emphases.

In addition, we also need to realize that the wrong first question to ask any Bible passage we read is “What does this text mean to me?” The right first question to ask is “What does this text mean?” followed by “How does that meaning apply to me?

Habits and disciplines such as these help us to understand key points and main messages of biblical passages. They help us to develop deeper insights into God’s word and grow our commitment to Sola Scriptura from mere rhetoric to reality!

Dr Calvin Chong is Associate Professor, Educational Ministries at the Singapore Bible College. His teaching and research interests include orality studies, hermeneutics, new educational technologies, designing learning experiences, the impact of narratives on worldview and values, conflict resolution/reconciliation, and contemporary urban missions and youth issues.

April 2018 Feature

Preamble

In contemporary society, a trend towards incivility seems to be rising. This article registers my observations about the shifts. I hope this article will invite many others to consider how we may pushback incivility for the sake of our society and for posterity.

Though the idea of civility may be traced to Confucius in the Eastern hemisphere, and Aristotle and Kant in the Western hemisphere, for this article, I take my reference from George Washington’ recommendation against displaying repulsive behavior and using vulgarity, whether in public or in private conversations (cf., Rules of Civility and Decent Behavior in Company and Conversation, 1888).

I define civility as relating to another person with respect in speech and conduct, regardless of their achievement, educational level, ethnicity, race, religion, social standing or acquired status of honor. Though the measure of civility, i.e., who defines right and wrong, is contextually dependent, my premise is that, people ought to have learned to respect others, in the light of a longstanding tradition in advocating for civility and in recognizing the equality of fellow humans.

Political Incivility?

While partisanship and political rudeness are not unfamiliar in America’s political landscape, Donald Trump’s presidential election and first year presidency have reached a new level of incivility. Trump degraded women, interrupted opponents in public debates, mocked the disabled, name-called, and used sexist comments on nations and women journalists and nations. After he was sworn into office, he has roused discord nationally and insulted various international leaders. Recently, he called two National Football League players who knelt at the singing of the national anthem, “son of a b—h.” A hyper-partisan media that uses blustering further aggravated the political incivility.

Aung San Suu Kyi, the de facto leader of Myanmar, was awarded a Nobel Peace Prize in 1991 for standing up for the powerless. Yet, she denied Rohingyan “minority-ethnic cleansing,” and seemingly condoned the killing of Rohingyan Muslims in 2017. In 2013, she too denied occurrence of ethnic troubles in Rakhine.

To these incidents, we add the brawling and throwing of chairs against fellow politicians in recent Uganda parliamentary debate, occurred at the end of September 2017.

Should not the highest public office seek incumbents who would lead with impeccable character and etiquette to reflect the dignity of their office, despite the realities of corruptions and politicking? Is condoning injustice, and keeping silent about abhorrent, inhumane socio-political situations acceptable? Though politics manifests differently in America and in Myanmar, I am troubled about a consistent wave of political incivility.

Journalistic Civility?

When news readership expects fair and even coverage of significant and pertinent news globally, between August and September 2017, many news agencies in the USA gave focal attention to Hurricane Harvey and Hurricane Irma, and almost to the exclusion of covering the even more devastating floods caused by monsoons in Sierra Leone, Nepal, India, and Bangladesh. Has the US media normalized disasters in other regions just like how they sometimes normalized violence in other regions?

Social Media Incivility?

The social media has seen incidents of incivility. The circulation of “fake news” via social media is what most people do not intentionally commit. While not verifying sources before forwarding to one’s social network may be harmless in some situations, fake news can produce consequences far deeper, even as it may add as a social cost.

Social media incivility is also observable in the circulation of viral pictures and videos, staged or un-staged, and the comments generated thereafter. The viral videos include the staged videos intended as advocacy for interest-groups, and the filmed, real life incidents of inappropriate social behaviors (e.g., bullying, sexual preying, cheating, and stealing).

The incivility with regards to viral videos pertains not just to filming someone else in public without their permission (thereby infringing another’s privacy) or shaming them thereafter on social media (which makes us vigilantes of sorts). Perpetuators of impropriety, injustice and violence against others have to be stopped. Alerting the public may deter some from committing impropriety, injustice and violence.

The incivility also pertains to 1) whether to make public the viral video, and 2) how viewers respond to incidents. The public may feel “safer” when incidents are made public. Yet, a viral circulation tends to affect lives, and injure persons and institutions, anger a crowd, risk breaking up social cohesion, and can cause other social problems.

Social Incivility?

Each society develops its culture in light of what it values and prioritises. I believe that given a choice, we would choose to live in a charitable, friendly, gracious, hospitable, kind, inclusive, and respectful society. Yet, have signs of social incivility crept up unnoticed in our hurried and driven lifestyle?

In our phone-distractible society, people check their phones in the middle of a conversation, at a meeting, or over dinner. On MRT rides, some commuters would blast their music without regard for other commuters. In fast-food and coffee outlets, boy and girls, who come from literate and well-to-do family backgrounds, use vulgarities like punctuation marks in their sentences.

Many passengers have had Grab and Uber drivers shouting rudely at them. Many are still aggravated over the SMRT technical problems, train delays, and the groundswell of discontentment with the SMRT CEO’s steep and swift pay increment, amid a fare increment that is not commensurate with a reliable, world-class operation.

On social medias, citizens respond curtly and with vulgarities to express their dissatisfaction and outrage. Name-calling, death threats, profanity, and all manner of insults are hurled at the perpetrator, the victims, and by-standers. In recent years, we have seen, on viral videos, by-standers watching bullying in schools without intervening.

I am betwixt between 1) my desire to encourage citizens to stand up for injustice or call out on inappropriate behaviors, and 2) my concerns about the unintended consequences that comments can stir in an already angry crowd.

On the one hand, as the saying goes – “he/she brought it on himself.” But on the other hand, no one deserves to be treated with violence. When persons in the viral videos are identified in public, some have “given them the finger.” Society judges victims too. The personal stigma, the social stigma, and the implications can continue for years, to the extent of destroying lives, families, institutions.

Postscript

To be sure, incivility is not a unique manifestation in our milieu. Rudeness, hate-speech, and shock jocks existed during Washington’s era too. Even then, philanthropic activities are also readily evident in our generation just as charity was evident in bygone eras. I perceive value in inquiring into the state and development of civility in our time. Is our milieu characterized as what Pankaj Mishra calls, the Age of Anger (Farrar Straus & Giroux, 2017)? How did we get here in sociality? How can we pushback the trends of incivility in our time? May this article be a step in the exploration of what may be possible, for re-envisioning our world together.

Rev. Dr. Timothy T. N. Lim, Ph.D., is a Visiting Lecturer at the London School of Theology. His recent book, Ecclesial Recognition with Hegelian Philosophy, Social Psychology, and Continental Political Theory (Brill, 2017), adds to his other publications on christian unity, ecclesiology, interreligious dialogue, and theology.

March 2018 Feature

Can the church help envision the cities of the future?

The 21^st Century world will be an urban world. The Asian Development Bank states in 2008 that over one billion people would have moved from the rural villages to the urban settings in Asia by 2030.

In another three decades, over 3 billion people in Asia (two-thirds of Asia) would have become urban dwellers.[1] Will we see an urban world where humans and God’s creation can flourish or one with a degraded environment where we live more like savages in the proverbial urban jungle?

Manuel Ortiz states that urban growth is more than a sociological reality; it is the fulfillment of God’s intentions since the beginning of time.[2]  The cultural mandate given to mankind to populate and steward the earth indicated that God has intended for human settlements to develop not only in the rural villages but also in the cities.

The earliest cities were built by the sons of Adam in the book of Genesis. The Bible traces how the history of mankind started in the garden but will end in the city.

Singapore is a small city, merely the size of a small district in some of these leading world-class cities in the world, but yet we are recognised today as global city. Singapore’s rise from a small fishing village to a world city, from the third world to the first, is well known now. It now aims to be a smart city in the 21^st Century.

Conn and Ortiz note that cities seek to create a dynamic environment as an integrating centre of influence and power, as the “symbolic centres that concentrate, intensify and orchestrate culture’s re-creating forces”.[3] Lily Kong notes that the new Singapore cityscape with her iconic architecture of commerce and culture reflects the city-state’s aspiration and claim as a cultural centre, in line with the government’s integrated urban, national and global ambitions.[4]

However, the more important investment will be in shaping and moulding a people who value the spiritual beyond the aesthetics, who value the soul alongside these technocratic capability. Can a global city have humanity and a soul?

To grow as a city with creativity and cultural influence, we need a sense of spiritual transcendence. It is a call to grow our soul, to touch base with our humanity, to have the courage to fulfil our destiny. It will mean valuing the history of not only the city but the historicity of the man in the street, exploring the social dimensions of our city and probing deeper into our own shared consciousness.

Can a city be a place to foster humanity and community?

Urbanism as the distinctive culture of the city is exciting and evolving, and the creative innovators are constantly transforming and transmitting the urban culture in the city. The church can play a part in the emerging urbanism. The urban church as an organic and organised community is a great resource for developing creative and sustainable urbanism.

However the church would need to be strategically aligned and structured for transformational urban ministry with broader vision and to re-invent herself for the opportunities which will call for innovative solutions and daring responses.[5] The urban church has to step out of the comfort zone, to first engage at street level, to be the Church incarnate and present at street level, in order to contribute to the new urbanscape.

The urban church can consider the three spiritual identities and roles in urban missions, viz. as priests, prophets and pilgrims.

Firstly, the urban church can unleash her members as priests to point people to God and His Kingdom. In the city where the masses live lives of stress and desperation, loneliness and despair, there are many who are constantly seeking Transcendence and the meaning of their lives.

The church and her members as priests can mediate the presence of God by pointing people to Transcendence and divine guidance as they work in the city, whether they are in the public, private or people sectors, whether they are formulating policies, enacting legislation or executing them. By modeling faith in God and faithfulness at school or at work, the church affirms the creation or cultural mandate given by God to be productive as we care for and “till the land”.

Secondly, the urban church needs to speak up and speak out prophetically as we voice and envision the cities which are fit for human flourishing and habitation. Currently, there are over 830 million urban poor living in the urban slums in cities around the world. Such urban mismanagement and urban squalor dehumanises people and perpetuates the degradation of the urban environment and contributes to the ecological crisis and climate change in the world.

The urban church cannot be content with merely saving souls for heaven at the expense of caring for God’s creation and creatures on this side of eternity. We need to speak up prophetically as we envision what God’s shalom would look like for the cities in the world.

The urban church can reference the New Urban Agenda which has been adopted by world leaders as part of the United Nations’ new sustainable development goals, which seeks to provide the roadmap for building cities as engines of prosperity, centres of cultural and social well-being while protecting the environment.[6]

The urban church speaks and acts prophetically when it participates in policy inputs and planning at the municipal level, contribute to development of new urban spaces and lead in community building in the local neighbourhood. The urban church participates through mobilising the members and community with the wide range of skills, training and expertise to help shape the new urban landscape and urban culture.

Finally, the urban church can model for the city what God’s pilgrims look like, a community of strangers who have settled in the city and yet awaiting the arrival of the city, not built by human hands, whose architect and builder is God. The pilgrim community is a community of strangers bonded not necessarily by historical, national, ethno-linguistic or cultural ties.

The pilgrim community is created by faith in Christ, faith in a common eschatological future in the Kingdom of God. That is why it is an eschatological community with the responsibility and power to love one another and to serve one another, especially in the historical situations it finds itself including the times of human suffering.

Can the urban church model and translate the kingdom values of love, acceptance and compassion in new urban communities comprising migrants from over a hundred nationalities and ethnicities? Can the urban church help build communities of perseverance and resilience in times of disaster and crisis based on the pilgrim’s vision of serving one another as we journey together to the celestial city?

The church in the city can become an urban church when it develops an eschatological vision for transforming the city with the transcendent values of God’s Kingdom.[7] Just as Singapore as a city-state had announced the lofty aspiration of Singapore to become a global city serving beyond the Southeast Asian hinterland, the church in Singapore can aspire and envision itself to become an urban church, an Antiochan church serving the cities of Asia and beyond.

Notes:

[1] http://www.adb.org/news/op-ed/liveable-clean-green-and-resilient-reshaping-asia-s-booming-cities-takehiko-nakao

[2] Manuel Ortiz, “The Church and the City” in Manuel Ortiz and Susan Baker eds. The Urban Face of Mission, p. 43

[3] Harvey M Conn & Manuel Ortiz, Urban Ministry: The Kingdom, the City & the People of God, 2001: IVP Academic, p. 222

[4] Lily Kong, “Cultural Icons, Global City and National Identity” in Michael Nai-Chiu Poon, ed., Engaging Society: The Christian in Tomorrow’s Singapore.  2013: Trinity Theological College. Pp 24-40

[5] Lawrence Ko, “The Role of the Asian Church in Missions” in Bambang Budijanto ed., Emerging Missions Movements: Voices of Asia, 2010: Compassion  International and Asia Evangelical Alliance, pp 1-10

[6] http://www.un.org/sustanabledevelopment/blog/2016/10/newurbanagenda

[7] Lawrence Ko, “The Church and the Soul of a Global City: An Eschatological Vision for 21^st C Singapore” in Sadiri Joy Tira & Tetsunao Yamamori eds., Scattered and Gathered; A Global Compendium of Diaspora Missiology, Regnum Books International, 2016, pp.360-366.

Lawrence Ko is the National Director of Singapore Centre for Global Missions. He has been a pastor, corporate trainer and missions director over the past 27 years, engaged with projects in human resource development, Christian media and environmentalism.